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Research into particle physics is revealing a world full of almost magical qualities. Could it be that this mysterious, puzzling world is in fact the world of the spirit – the spiritual world that saints and mystics throughout history have sought to explo

Comment — Dec 5, 2013

The assessment below makes one serious error, which we elaborate in the footnote. Coming from a former head of Israeli Military Intelligence, this lapse is probably more than a mere oversight but a deliberate omission.

As a result we can only conclude that the following assessment is aimed at calming Israeli public fears, rather than being an objective evaluation of the impact of an Iranian counter-strike. Ed.

Yadlin: Scope of Iranian retaliation to potential strike is ‘exaggerated’

Yaakov Lappin — Jerusalem Post Dec 5, 2013

An Iranian retaliation to a military strike on its nuclear sites will likely be limited, and significantly smaller in scope than commonly believed in the West, a new study published by the head of the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS), Maj.-Gen. (res.) Amos Yadlin, said on Wednesday.

Yadlin, formally head of Military Intelligence, and Avner Golov, a senior INSS researcher, published, together, a systematic overview of Iran’s military capabilities and assessed the likely Iranian strategic calculations when choosing a response.

They concluded that the nightmare scenarios of regional full-scale war is exaggerated and “serves Iran as an excellent deterrence mechanism, since it weakens the credibility of the military option and decreases the chances of the Iranian regime agreeing to a diplomatic solution.”

They said that “the option of an attack on Iran, as well as the threat of it, is an important and central mechanism in the service of diplomacy.”

Iran’s main retaliatory strike force is composed of 300-400 surface-to-surface missiles, made up of the Shihab 3 with a range of 1,300 km., and the Ghadir with a range of over 1,600 km., the authors wrote.

“Both of these missiles do not have high accuracy and do not allow for the pinpoint striking of a target,” the paper said.

The Shihab’s Circular Error Probable (CEP), indicating its accuracy, is over two kilometers, and the Ghadir’s CEP is hundreds of meters.

A Shihab can carry a one-ton warhead of conventional explosives, and the Ghadir can carry 750 kg.

Missile strikes can be used to terrorize cities, rather than hitting targets accurately, Yadlin and Golov said.

Actual damage can be contained to a minimum, through early warning alerts for civilians, an efficient use of the Arrow 2 anti-missile shield, and an improvement in projectile defense fortifications for the general population.

Although suspicions exist that Iran can arm its missiles with chemical and biological warheads, their low accuracy and ineffectiveness as unconventional delivery systems, combined with Iran’s understanding that such a move will provoke a massive military response, will prevent such a scenario, said the authors.

An additional threat exists in the form of Iran’s extraterritorial terrorism capabilities, embodied by the IRGC’s Quds Force.

Past Quds Force attempts to carry out attacks in revenge for covert strikes on the Iranian nuclear program show the limitations of this apparatus, the study said.

“These [Iranian] efforts failed and they point to a limited Iranian ability to carry out wide-scale terror attacks, and to a good ability to foil them in the Western world,” the authors stated, before concluding that this threat can be contained.

Other potential threats include Iran’s air force and fleet of drones.

Iran’s fighter jets are inferior to those of Israel, which enjoys two layers of air defenses against hostile intrusions: Interception aircraft and a chain of anti-aircraft weapon systems.

Iran’s most advanced jets, the Sukhoi 24, cannot get to Israel and back without midair refueling and would be vulnerable to air defense radars.

Iran’s drones are also primitive in comparison with their Western counterparts, “and do not allow much operational flexibility after their launch,” the study said.

The most realistic UAV threat consists of “suicide drones from Lebanon or Syria” that could be deployed, and this scenario merits preparations, but is “not the kind of threat that Israel can’t absorb,” the paper continued.

Iran’s long-range naval strike capabilities are “very limited,” the paper said, and consists mainly of Soviet-made submarines that operate in the Persian Gulf and Indian Ocean.

Ships that can reach Israeli shores would have a hard time crossing the Suez Canal during a conflict, and would likely run into Israel Navy ships armed with advanced sea-to-sea missiles.

An attack boat disguised as a civilian vessel might be used to launch sea-to-shore missiles and mini suicide submarines could be deployed, though this threat can be countered by Israel as well, according to the study.

There is no Iranian ground force option to speak of, due to the 1,200 km. distance between the two countries, Yadlin and Golov said.

Iran’s capabilities are far from “Gog and Magog” scenarios and are limited to missile strikes and terror attacks, the effects of which will be principally psychological, they wrote.

If an initial attack on Iran is surgical and aimed only at nuclear sites, Iran, when weighing responses will wish to preserve its survival and decision makers in Tehran will likely seek to avoid a response that could suck the US into a conflict with Iran.

Similarly, Tehran will likely seek to avoid provoking a large-scale second Israeli wave of attacks that could be used to cause more damage to nuclear sites, as well as targeting regime assets.

Yadlin and Golov set out a scale of five possible Iranian responses, ranging from total restraint to a regional escalation.

This scenario would see “a significant number of missiles fired from Iran and Lebanon towards Dimona or any other target perceived as being ‘nuclear-associated’ in Israel, in order to send a message of parity between Iran and Israel, and maybe even strike the Israeli facilities.”

“There’s a high chance that this method of operation will be included in the Iranian response, as a wider response, or a limited Iranian response,” the authors said.

Alternatively, Iran could widen its response and include the activation of terrorism cells, while also firing off one or two missile barrages at Israeli cities, and target Saudi and Western targets in the Gulf.

Suicide missions from the air and sea are also possible.

“We believe that the chances of such an Iranian response is high if a Western attack hits Iranian nuclear infrastructure but does not harm other regime assets,” the study said.

Such a response would enable Iran to balance out its need to reply to an attack, but avoid an escalation that will threaten regime assets not directly tied to the military nuclear project.

A more serious yet less likely potential response, according to the study, would be sparked by an Iranian desire to avenge its national honor, punish Israel and isolate it from the US.

Comment — Dec 5, 2013

In case you didn’t notice, Yadlin’s assessment only mentions two Iranian surface-to-surface missile: the “Shihab 3 (Shahab) with a range of 1,300 km., and the Ghadir (Ghadr)”.

Neither of these missiles are the most advanced in Iran’s arsenal. In fact they’ve both been superseded by the more advanced Sejil, which has a longer range, greater accuracy and is more difficult to detect. All of which may account Yadlin’s failure to mention missile in his assessment.

Another reason is that Iran has at least 20 Sejil on mobile launchers, making them much more difficult to locate as targets, and these mobile launchers would be able to respond almost immediately to an Israeli strike.

Moreover, Yadlin’s assessment seems to be based on the assumption of a victorious strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities. But given their distance and number of potential targets, and Iran’s own efforts to bolster its defensive capability, there’s absolutely no guarantee of a successful Israeli strike.

Nor does he mention the likelihood of Russian of Chinese intervention. Only American intervention and we know who they would be fighting for.

Iran in 2013 is not Iraq in 1981 and Israel in unlikely to see a repeat of OperationOpera. Then Israeli jets had only one target. If Israel decided to strike Iran now there would be many more targets, each far better defended than Iraq’s Osirak reactor ever was.

As we said in the introduction, this reads more like an attempt to soothe Israeli public fears rather than a objective assessment.